Nalini Sriharan, a life convict in the Rajiv Gandhi assasination case, has forwarded a petition to the Tamil Nadu Home Secretary urging the government to consider her plea for early release. The plea comes two days after the Supreme Court asked the Tamil Nadu Governor to consider the mercy petition of A G Perarivalan, another convict in the 1991 case. A life convict at the Special Prison for Women here, Nalini in her petition recalled that she had made a representation on February 22, 2014 to the government seeking her release under Article 161 of the Constitution. Article 161 deals with the judicial powers of the governor of a state.

Her plea for release was in accordance with the state government's 1994 Scheme of Premature Release of Life Convicts, she said. In her petition, which she forwarded through the Superintendent of Prisons here Friday and made available to the media, she said following her 2014 petition, she moved the High Court in 2015 seeking a direction to the government to consider her plea for release. In its order dated July 20, 2016, the Madras High Court had said the authorities were at liberty to consider her representation in accordance with law subject to the outcome of another writ petition in the Supreme Court.